In general, a visually handicapped person means man who loses one's sight and optical sense due to an eye disease and thus can not tell even the brightness and darkness, and also includes man who has very weak sight and thus can discriminate the brightness and darkness and recognize movement of a hand before one's eye. The weak-sighted persons who have a majority among the visually handicapped persons can not recognize a subject like a character or a diagram using general glasses or contact lens due to weakening of the lens, iris, retina and visual nervous system.
A portable video magnifying apparatus is to magnify an image of a subject such as small characters in a book, a phial, a check or currency and the like, which are difficult to see, and thus assist the defective vision of the weak-sighted person and the aged person. The portable video magnifying apparatus is provided with a rechargeable battery and can be used in any place even where a power line can not be connected, so that the weak-sighted person and the aged person can see exactly the subject.
However, in a conventional portable video magnifying apparatus, to see a distant subject, a user should go near the subject, and also even though the user goes near the subject, if the subject is positioned at a higher place than user's eye level, the user can not make certain the subject. In order to make certain the subject, the user should ask other person for help. Alternatively, since the user has to prepare a separate distant video magnifying apparatus like a telescope, it is an economical burden and also it is inconvenient to carry it. Further, since it is difficult to notice a position of a photographing lens which is placed at a lower surface of a display part, it takes unnecessary time to find the position of the subject. And also there is an inconvenience in that when the user writes something, the user should obliquely take the portable video magnifying apparatus in one hand so that the photographing lens is directed to the subject so as to check it.
Therefore, there arises the necessity for unifying long and short distance image detecting parts to save a space. Further, image pausing and storing functions are required in order to check the subject positioned at a higher place than the eye level, and the position of the photographing lens has to be capable of easily recognized by the user so that the position of the subject can be found rapidly. And when the user writes something, in order to check it, only the short distance image detecting part has to be capable of being pivoted while the portable video magnifying apparatus is put therearound. Furthermore, the portable video magnifying apparatus has to be capable of being connected with TV, and TV images can be output through the portable video magnifying apparatus so as to help the weak-sighted person who has a narrow viewing angle and thus can not see the whole screen.